Science and Anti-science

What is good science? What goal is the proper goal of scientific activity? Is there a legitimating authority that scientists may claim? These questions have long been debated, but, as Gerald Holton points out, every era must offer its own responses. This book examines these questions not in the abstract but shows their historical roots and the answers emerging from the scientific and political controversies of the 20th century. Employing the case-study method and the concept of scientific themata that he has pioneered, Holton displays the broad scope of his insight into the workings of science: from the influence of Ernst Mach on 20th-century physicists, biologists, psychologists and other thinkers to the rhetorical strategies used in the work of Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr; from the way Thomas Jefferson dealt with the US Congress concerning the federal sponsorship of scientific research to philosophical debates since Oswald Spengler over whether our scientific knowledge will ever be "complete".